Lauren & art21

Of the four artists reviewed, Ann Hamilton is the only one who can be more rightly described as modernist rather than post-modernist. The way she views the world is highly conceptual, and the methid in which she presents he concepts through her works is often in the “advant garde” theme. You get the sense she wants us to look at the world around us in a way we haven’t experienced before, like her mouth-camera portraits and her fascination with the concept of the line.

The other three artists are better classifies as post-modernist:

McGee and Swoon, in trying to be respectable artist but retain their “street” cred, bounce off the origin of graffiti while also re-interpreting it in a way that is suitable for an art gallery installation. I didn’t think much o their work but I thought the whole idea of tailoring one’s work for a specific space that represents the culture we live in, even as the work itself comes from something that’s about defying convention and putting a mark where it doesn’t belong is more than a little amusing.

KaraWalker and Shahzia Sikande lend themselves as the most obviously post-modern, because both of them are very influenced by their backgrounds and how their history relates to the world around them. Sikande goes for an extremely global interpretation that is both informed by her Pakistani background, but also must reject it to some extent. It creates a really interesting identity paradox. Walker deals with culture in a much more personalized way, dealing with loaded subjects like racism and telling them with a very stark, poignant use of silhouettes. Of all the artists, I like Walker the best because of the way she utilizes such a minimalist visual to tell such complex and jarring narratives. I also like how she does not shy away from controversy; she creates images that illicit a reaction from both the black and white communities for very different reasons, and uses her work to force people to confront issues we’d rather avoid. It is very easy for an artist who deals with such a loaded issue to fall into the visceral-reaction category—making art just to get a rise out of people, to play up on easy targets like white guilt and black anger—but I don’t find her work to fall into that category. She handles the issues deftly and interestingly, and even more importantly the impact of the work itself lives up to her intent.